Reports about four months ago on the arrest of Shaul
Youdkevitch, director of the Kabbalah Learning Center in Tel
Aviv, dealt a harsh blow to the city's Bohemians and
"spiritual seekers." Youdkevitch was arrested on suspicions
of fraud and exploitation, when a couple filed a complaint
alleging that his Kabbalah Learning Center had demanded a
large financial contribution in exchange for the wife's
recovery from a severe illness.

This is not the image the Kabbalah Learning Center imparted
over the years. And they are not alone. Under the disguise of
"spiritual" aid for the wayward, and through false, distorted
and deceitful use of sifrei Kabboloh, thousands of
Jews — and non-Jews — have come streaming into
the Kabbalah Learning Center and similar places around the
world.

Numerous warnings have been issued against this dangerous
fad, particularly since we are exhorted not to engage in
Kabboloh studies until having mastered Shas and
poskim.

Yet these so-called kabbalists, who really understand nothing
of what is written in sifrei Kabboloh, take advantage
of those who want something more than today's Western
materialism to make easy money by offering mental, physical
and spiritual healing "based on kabbalistic teachings." And
these various kabbalah centers around the world are raking in
millions of dollars every year. In Israel, experts define the
kabbalah centers as mystic cults in every sense.

$60,000 to Drive Off the Disease

Boris and Leah Zunis of Rishon Letzion paid the Kabbalah
Learning Center $60,000 to cure her of cancer. Searching for
any possible remedy, the two arrived at the Kabbalah Learning
Center and registered for a series of classes, believing that
the study of kabbalistic teachings would deliver her from her
sickness. Yet as they continued studying and the disease
continued to take hold of her body, the Kabbalah Learning
Center managed to extract enormous sums from them.

"My wife heard all of the lectures about driving off cancer,
and asked to have emphasis placed on her to receive strength
in healing," her husband told Yediot Achronot. Moshe
Rosenberg, then director of the Center, told the couple that
they would have to make a donation to get cured. They met
Rosenberg in his office. "He told me we would have to donate
money. I asked him how much. Five thousands shekels? Ten
thousand? Then he told me it would have to be a `painful'
donation, an amount that would leave us feeling a shortage of
money—the whole family."

Boris says Rosenberg was not satisfied with the sums he
suggested and then he proposed an amount: $36,000. "I was
shocked and told him I didn't have that kind of money. I said
maybe I could come in after work to work there in the
evenings as a volunteer. But he suggested I quit my job as a
computer programmer and work at the Kabbalah Center on a
volunteer basis. I told him I have three children, a home, a
mortgage. Leah had stopped working and begun new treatments.
I told him I could not stop working because there was nobody
to pay for all this. There was nobody to support the
family."

Boris' wife was "deep in kabbalah," he says. "She came to me
in tears, saying, `This is about my health and my life.' She
pleaded and her crying broke me. I could already feel how he
was reaching his hand into my pocket. He promised me health
and a full recovery if we paid him the money. I really felt
that if I didn't pay the money I would be playing a part in
her death. I took all of our savings and sold everything we
had, and together with loans from friends we managed to pay
the money."

Of course, Mrs. Zunis showed no signs of improvement as a
result. When the disease worsened she spoke with the current
director of the Kabbalah Learning Center, Shaul Youdkevitch,
who said she must pay another $25,000. They took the money
from her mother's pension plan.

At the beginning of Tishrei, Mrs. Zunis passed away. A short
time earlier she had begun to realize she had been swindled,
but by then it was too late. The money had already been
swallowed up into the millions the Center rolls in every
year. But before her petiroh the couple filed a police
report and an investigation was opened.

Boris Zunis also filed a civil lawsuit through Atty. Chaim
Cohen. The Center could not understand why Boris was upset
with them. "The Center's members prayed for her well-being
every day and it's well known that `Tzedokoh tatzil
mimoves,' " the Center replied.

Kabbalah Water from the Tap

The police took the investigation seriously, and Shaul
Youdkevitch was placed in custody for 24 hours, followed by
five days of house arrest. During questioning, he was asked
about the "holy water" (an idea borrowed from the Christians)
recommended to Leah Zunis at a price of NIS 26 per liter
(about $6 per quart). Youdkevitch claimed it is "special
water prepared by a biochemist in Canada. It comes from
Niagara Falls in Ontario." Police investigators believe it to
be regular water.

Obviously, this was at best regular mineral water (if not
regular tap water), yet Zeev Shtiglitz of Lev L'Achim, head
of the Anti-Cult Forum, hired Professor Rafi Semiat, head of
the Desalination Laboratory and the Institute for Water
Research at the Technion, to analyze the water. "These claims
are a bunch of nonsense, cleverly designed to convince
innocent people to be swindled," he writes. "Anyone who buys
this water is throwing away his money."

The Anti-Cult Forum is a general organization that was
started ten years ago by Rabbi Zeev Shtiglitz to combat cults
in Israel, including kabbalah centers. Not surprisingly,
Shtiglitz is also one of the heads of Lev L'Achim's anti-
missionary department. He came to the conclusion that secular
people should be recruited to form an umbrella organization.
Together with groups like Worried Parents, an organization
for parents whose children have been taken in by various cult
groups, field work got underway.

Even before the Forum began to fight against known cults in
Israel, it was decided to launch a battle against the
Kabbalah Learning Center. At a conference, testimonials were
given by young people who had been pulled in to the cult,
enslaved to the directors and one woman who even said she had
been so enthralled that she donated her home to the Kabbalah
Center.

"I was in a bubble," recalls one victim. "I felt a special
light that gave me a feeling of calm." But this young woman,
just like hundreds of other young people who were sucked into
the Kabbalah Center's activities, said that the volunteer
staff there submitted totally to the directors' every want
and whim.

(As a side note, in order to win over these wayward youths
the Kabbalah Center would point to the fact that the
chareidim were combating their work, which they claimed
served as a clear sign that it was a worthwhile cause. "In a
place where there is a revelation of light the Satan seeks a
foothold, therefore the chareidim are working against the
Center," one of the directors told the volunteers. The Bnei
Baruch Institute in Petach Tikva, another organization that
began by selling kabbalah, printed a pamphlet that says in
black and white, "Clearly the wisdom of kabbalah, as a
science that directs the individual solely toward
introspection and inner change, distances the individual from
all external rituals and commandments of any religious
stream. Therefore all religions—and Judaism in
particular— object to the science of kabbalah." Today
it has been transformed into a wholly Christian cult with
various pronouncements against Judaism.)

The Hidden Light: Money

The world's leading kabbalah cult figure is Dr. Philip Berg,
who casts himself as an observant Jew, although those who
know him define him as Reform, at best, in practice. He is
not the only one. The Kabbalah Centers that Berg opened in
Tel Aviv and other locations (50 branches worldwide) are
being imitated by competitors trying to seize hold of "the
hidden light," including places like Bnei Baruch, a
kabbalistic group headed by Michael Leitman of Petach
Tikva.

The Anti-Cult Forum is gathering a growing number of
testimonials indicating that the various kabbalah centers are
posing a ever greater threat. Presumably the Zunises are not
the only people to be swindled and Youdkevitch is not the
only "kabbalist" swindler.

"The Tassia-Glazer Report, published nearly 20 years ago,
described the nature of cults in Israel," says Rabbi
Shtiglitz. "Kabbalah cults were not yet operating at the
time, but according to the characteristics listed in the
government report on cults in Israel, clearly the Kabbalah
Center would fall under the category of a cult.

"A cult is the word given to a group of people who believe in
ideas that are not a part of the central ideological streams
in society. What distinguishes a cult from a religion or an
organization is generally the number of cult members and the
distinctiveness of its ideas — how different they are
from the mainstream. As long as the people who join the cult
have full access to the cult's teachings and tradition and
can elect to leave the cult without fear of retribution the
cult is not considered dangerous or destructive."

Massive Blackmailing

How can you tell if a kabbalah center is a cult? Very
simple.

A BBC investigation described the World Kabbalah Center as a
cult that has turned into an enormous blackmailing operation,
demanding that members contribute 10 percent of their
income.

A long feature on kabbalah cults that appeared in Yediot
Achronot included testimonials by parents of kabbalah
cult victims. One mother describes how her twin sons became
"addicted to kabbalah." One of them is still receiving
constant psychiatric treatment. It all began when one of them
decided to study kabbalah.

"His eyes began to shine," she recalls. "Until then he had
been socially isolated. He didn't have friends. When he went
there, people took care of him. Gradually he began to spend
Shabbatot and holidays there with his new friends. And every
meal costs money, tens of shekels. He severed himself from my
family and cleared out his bank account. All of his savings
— thousands of shekels — went. Later he convinced
his twin brother to come to the center. He began to volunteer
there, too. They began to grow beards because at the center
they were told that light comes into one's life through hair
shafts and this fills the body with positive energy."

The two brothers began spending all their time at the center.
One of them entered deeper into the cult's innermost circle
— until it was decided to send him to the world center
in Los Angeles.

He spent a year there, totally severed from his family. One
day he called his mother. "Ima, I can't stay here any more.
I'm coming home."

He returned to Israel and went insane. He was so used to
washing the floors of the office from morning to night that
when he came back to Tel Aviv he would roam the streets and
clean them out of habit.

"Our lives have been destroyed. Our other son is still
studying at the Center, even though he saw what happened to
his brother. I don't know how to get him out of there. He
keeps spending money left and right and is wasting his
life."

Baited Trap

"The moment you step into [the Kabbalah Center] everyone is
nice and courteous to you," says Rabbi Shtiglitz. "There are
people to hang out with, really the veteran volunteers, whose
job is to market the Zohar and kabbalah. They cling to
whoever enters the center, start talking to him and smiling
at him. The goal is to get his name and address. Then they
start sending him written materials, inviting him to lectures
and group Shabbatot."

Former Kabbalah Center workers recall receiving clear
instructions to set their eyes and hands on the money of new
enthusiasts. Ruth Brunstatt, who spent eight years as a
member of the center and lost all of her assets, says workers
were instructed "by the cadre and the more veteran [staffers]
to identify the crisis of the person who came to visit the
center and stood before us. We developed sensors to detect
people in crisis."

Shtiglitz says that a dangerous cult is an authoritarian
organization built like a pyramid, with one person or a group
of people at the top who have dictatorial control over the
organization. "A dangerous cult uses methods based on fraud
and deceit to recruit new members. A dangerous cult makes use
of psychological techniques to create dependence on the group
and to maintain members' obedience to it. Dangerous cults
generally try to shape their members according to the
personality of the leader or the cult's ideal by suppressing
thinking, through criticism and self- criticism —
rather than fostering individuality, creativity and the
personal freedom and will of each and every individual."

This matches precisely Philip Berg's modus operandi. "When
someone goes inside, there are hierarchies. There are ranks.
Everyone wants to be part of the in-group. Everyone wants to
be close to the director and at the highest level the head of
the cult — guru Philip Berg." Kabbalah centers make
money not just by exploiting people who submit themselves to
the directors, but also by selling kabbalah courses. For
example, a ten-part course called "Principles of Kabbalah"
costs NIS 1,100 ($235).

The Name of the Game: Money

"Arriving at a lecture in Haifa I was told that two of the
participants were members of the Scientology cult and I was
asked to speak with them," recalls HaRav Aharon Levy, a
lecturer at Arachim. "It's very hard to speak with people
held hostage in a cult, because they lock themselves up and
defend the place from which they derive gratification. But at
the end of the lecture they approached me.

"I sat down with them and explained to them that I had no
intention of explaining to them what was not good or
dangerous in Scientology. But I asked the woman how long she
had been a member of the cult. `Eight months,' she said. `And
how much has it cost you?' `NIS 8,000 [$1,700]' she replied.
I said, `Have you thought about why they are asking you for
so much money when their only intention, according to what
you are saying, is to help you? And, by the way, did anyone
here ask you for money when you came in? Think about it . . .
'

"Two weeks ago, she called to thank me for `saving her life.'
She said my remarks made her stop and think. Today she is a
baalas teshuvoh."

Money is the name of the game. Few are the people who were
saved from cults — including kabbalah cults — by
the skin of their teeth without having had to part with some
of their money. Sometimes it means wiping out years of
savings or the sale of assets to fund the avarice of the head
of the cult, who is already wealthy, or total submission and
enslavement to the cult's values and principles — and
most of all to the head guru.

Why Do They Go?

The large number of young people streaming into kabbalah
cults in recent years begs the question: Why are they drawn
to this? What leads young, educated professionals and Tel
Aviv bohemians to go to a kabbalah cult in search of the
spirituality they sorely lack? What is lacking at
teshuvoh seminars, which provide it for free in a far
more genuine and persuasive way?

Every secular Jew is wary of a course on Judaism. Only
persuasion or a deep desire by the individual to take part in
a seminar could lead one to overcome his apprehension and
reluctance to come to a Torah lecture series. Others are
simply afraid to confront the implications of knowing the
truth, but still they are looking for spirituality.

Spirituality is a fundamental human need. They don't find it
in India, because there it has become commercialized, but
there are other alternatives. Kabbalah has the perfect
formula: in Hebrew, spiritual and with no obligations.

The Emptiness of Materialism

"Today there is great emptiness and disappointment from
materialism throughout the world," says HaRav Aharon Levy of
Arachim, who is very familiar with this yearning for
something spiritual. "Materialism has exhausted itself as an
ideal. The young and secular —- both Jews and non-Jews
— realize that to make materialistic hedonism into an
ideal will not succeed. This rupture was created following
the breach in moral boundaries on one hand and the tremendous
material abundance on the other.

"This is apparent abroad, especially in wealthy nations.
People begin to adopt ideals such as environmentalism or
animal rights. People are looking for gratification or
meaning in life, beyond the materialistic lives they lead.
There is also a real identity crisis among Israeli youth, who
do not even consider looking into Orthodox Judaism. Therefore
the sterile Jewish alternative is the modern kabbalah
institute. No beards, no payos, no black —
Judaism Lite."

HaRav Levy says that these youths are not driven by a search
for truth. "They do not particularly want to subject their
materialistic and hedonistic needs to truth. Their search
stems from the need for peace of mind. Therefore, they prefer
to find meaning that is convenient and without obligation.
It's far more attractive, less nagging and this makes it much
more alluring."

Yated Ne'eman: And what exactly do the kabbalah
institutes sell them?

HaRav Levy: It's a very big temptation because
kabbalah teachings are not as mystical as people generally
think. They are very logical and even scientific. Kabbalah
teachings have rules, processes, etc. Therefore, people who
are accustomed to academic thinking find it very easy to
connect to the kabbalistic way of thinking. It is very
orderly, nothing disappears, everything is built
hierarchically. The Kabbalah Institute and places like it
provide people with courses in kabbalah, without any
obligation to change their ways. Really, they are selling
spiritual pleasure at a very cheap price.

In Orthodox Jewry, when a person comes and wants to partake
in a spiritual experience, he is told there are no shortcuts.
One has to start from the beginning. There are obligations,
there are changes in one's conduct, in observing mitzvas. But
these people come in search of "truth" to enjoy life. These
are the people who come to study kabbalah.

The meaning the Torah brings to life requires changes that
not everyone is prepared to make, in exchange for spiritual
peace of mind, so this deters people. Instead they go to
kabbalah cults.

YN: And how is the man-in-the-street persuaded to come
to the kabbalah institutes?

HaRav Levy: The direct and indirect message to the
secular public is simple and readily absorbed: that need you
want to fill and are afraid to pay the price — here it
is relatively cheap. You don't have to wear a yarmulke, you
don't have to change, and you don't have to keep Shabbos.
Just come and study and pay money. The only cost is money and
what is money in exchange for spiritual meaning? You give us
the money, we'll give you the meaning.

Note that the various kabbalah institutes portray the
chareidi public to new members in a very negative light.
Kabbalah institutes sneer at Orthodoxy, both tactically and
strategically. Tactically, in order to avoid suspicions of
being religious, although they define themselves as such, and
strategically, to keep members from recognizing the lie.

YN: So all of this "kabbalah" activity is divorced
from Judaism?

HaRav Levy: Just this week someone told me about a
person who studied at a certain kabbalah institute and asked
to lay tefillin. When he asked the guide, he was told,
"I don't think you have reached this level. Wait a bit." This
provides an indication that the eagerness for kabbalah
derives from people's search for gratification and the
understanding that it is not to be found in wanton
materialism. They are not willing to pay a high price for it.
Therefore the kabbalah institutes pop up like mushrooms after
the rain and offer a sense of connectedness to spirituality
at a low price.

YN: Like Christianity?

HaRav Levy: Indeed. That was the Christian technique
precisely. It sold idol worshipers a spiritual connection
without any obligation beyond being a "good" person.